Category: Get More Tax Clients

Just in case you don’t keep up with IRS regulatory changes on a day to day basis, yesterday was a momentous day. After 15 years, the IRS finally fixed the single greatest problem with the Offer in Compromise program, and reduced the remaining income multiplier from 48 or 60 down to 12 or 24 when calculating the Reasonable Collection Potential (RCP).

In addition, the IRS is now allowing Federal student loan payments and delinquent state and local taxes as an allowable expense, and has expanded the national standards under the miscellaneous category to allow room for minimum credit card payments.

What does this mean for you? It creates an incredible marketing opportunity, as the minimum acceptable Offer amount for prospective clients just dropped by as much as 80%. This will drastically increase the number of people that can (and will) file processable Offers.

In particular, I see this as an opportunity to tackle two distinct target markets:

1. High dollar Trust Fund Recovery Penalty (IRC 6672) cases, particularly those with lien amounts between about $100,000 and $250,000.
2. Mid-range 1040 debtors (those that owe approximately $15,000 to $50,000) that have traditionally been blocked from the Offer program because of the remaining income multiplier.

This kind of marketing opportunity has been handed to us on a silver platter by the IRS approximately once per year for the past three years now. If you missed this opportunity in 2010 and 2011, then be sure to take advantage of it now.

Here are my suggestions for exactly HOW to take advantage of this policy change:

1. Utilize the 80% reduction in the minimum Offer amount statistic in your direct mail pieces, email newsletters, blog posts, and telemarketing scripts.
2. If you traditionally only market to businesses, start marketing to individuals using the criteria I suggested above.
3. Create a limited-time flat fee Offer in Compromise service, and market it heavily.
4. Go through your list of prospects from the past 6 to 9 months that did not hire you, and call, email, and mail them in regards to the new OIC criteria.

I guarantee you that some astute practitioner out there that doesn’t subscribe to this newsletter is thinking along the same lines as this, and is going to take action. The relaxation of the OIC criteria is going to create a slew of potential new clients in the marketplace, and you can choose to either take advantage … Continue reading

This is the story of a small CPA firm (three partners) in New York City that hired me in January 2011 to help them grow their tax resolution business. I worked with them to create a written, systematic, and scheduled marketing process to drive sales of this service, which then fed sales of their other service offerings.

The firm employs no sales closers, and they rely exclusively on old tax lien filings (3 to 6 months old) as sales leads. They use old leads because, after a couple months, the vast majority of tax resolution firms have quit calling them, and they are therefore able to pick up clients with very little simultaneous telemarketing competition.

The firm’s telemarketers (“openers”) call these tax liens to verify that they’ve got the correct business, confirm that the tax lien is still an issue, and collect an email address and/or fax number and obtain permission to send “free information regarding how to get the IRS off their back” — there is absolutely no “selling” involved in a traditional sense. They then immediately receive a two-page introduction letter via fax and/or email, and they also receive a 12-page info packet (a 9 page sales letter, 2 page engagement letter, and a payment form) in the mail that comes in a specialized red “Rush Priority Express” envelope.

Every 5 days for 60 days, without fail, completely on automation, the prospect gets an email and/or fax with a short blurb (about two paragraphs) about a tax topic, and an offer — free consultation with a CPA (NOT a salesman), a free review of their latest IRS notice, X percent off representation, free end of year 940 prep, two 941’s prepared during the course of representation, etc. These “touches” are a highly effective follow up program from the very beginning, and their phone rings off the hook.

The key to this tactic was the creation of the series of emails (duplicated as faxes) that go out over the course of a couple months, every 5 days. Prospects are bombarded with the risks of being in collections, the problem with going at it themselves, and what the firm can do to fix the situation. This follow up program puts the CPA on the “right side of the desk”, as prospects then call in for help, rather than the CPA having to be the aggressor and chase the prospect down.

The licensed partners close all … Continue reading

This daily checklist is very specific to working collections and examination cases. If this is not a practice area for you, then you can basically skip this entire article. For some practitioners, this is the majority of what we do, even during tax season.

Tax resolution work is often very time sensitive. A big piece of what clients actually pay for is to have the tax professional simple manage the process and ensure deadlines are met, taxpayer rights are preserved, etc. The actual paperwork involved in tax resolution also needs to be accurate, so there is an element of precision that needs to be maintained there, as well. Having a checklist to manage your way through this process helps immensely.

Tax Resolution Daily Client Checklist

1. Complete Tax Practitioner Priority Calls and file setup for new clients
2. Contact clients regarding outstanding document needs (including financial documentation and missing returns)
3. Sort and label incoming faxes and mail
4. Calendar any IRS deadlines
5. Update 433’s with new incoming information
6. Follow and update New Client Checklists
7. Make Revenue Officer and other Service phone calls
8. File all necessary Appeals, IA requests, OIC applications, penalty abatement applicatios, etc. for the day
9. Weekly followup with inactive clients

This checklist covers the majority of the actions I need to review on a daily basis in order to stay on track with all my clients. Having a plan like this for each day is the key secret to managing a large case file inventory. Each case file has it’s own written “plan of attack” that serves as a resolution plan and progress tracker for that particular case, but the overall daily checklist gives me a dummy check to make sure I stay on track on with all my clients.

Tomorrow we’ll delve into the Tax Preparation Client Daily Checklist.… Continue reading